


Incident

by Thea_Bromine



Series: Mirror Image [1]
Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-31
Updated: 2014-01-31
Packaged: 2018-01-10 16:57:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 21,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1162226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thea_Bromine/pseuds/Thea_Bromine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just your basic screw-to-avert-the-apocalypse fic, version 1.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Virginity Clause

Part One – The Virginity Clause

“O.K., G-man, what’s the big deal?” Xander was fidgeting. Oz was not. Oz never did. He was... Giles liked him, liked him a lot. Oz was intelligent, and _restful_. Giles could hold a conversation with him, or at least as close to a conversation as anybody could hold with Oz, and several times they had spent an evening together, working through Giles’ record collection. Oz had brought him a couple of CDs later, on the ‘if you like that, you’ll like this’ principle, and although Giles was always suspicious of that as a working hypothesis, he had found that Oz’s instincts were good that way.

He still preferred vinyl, though.

It would be a good deal easier to explain this to Oz than to Xander. Oz was much more likely than Xander to sit still and listen, all the way to the end, without interrupting, so that Giles could _tell_ him the things he knew, the things he suspected, the answers to the questions he knew they would both have. Oz would be _much_ more likely than Xander to take a relaxed view of, of the, the... Neither of them would be keen, he was certain of that, but Oz would see the necessity. Oz would be pragmatic. Xander... would not. Xander would argue and object and _talk_ , on and even on, jumping in with the questions that Giles was about to get to so that the explanation came in the wrong order and took three times as long as it needed to, because that was what Xander did, and _then_ Xander would do whatever needed to be done because that was also what Xander did.

The Slayer, thought Giles, was unbelievably fortunate in her friends. He had spent some of his less than copious free time researching whether _any_ Slayer had ever had a coterie before, and apart from one in the seventeenth century with two Watchers – twins – he thought Buffy was the first. Yes, he grumbled about Willow’s tendency to think that anything could be fixed using magic, and Oz’s lunar inconvenience was, well, inconvenient, and Xander drove him regularly to the very verges of insanity, but he couldn’t deny that he felt better for having some sort of backup.

“Giles?” The soft prompting was Oz.

“Yes. Well.” He’d been half a day translating and re-translating, desperate to find the place where he had made a mistake, even though he knew he hadn’t; then he had spent another half day trying to write a script which would allow him to explain this without embarrassment. Without making Oz blink and Xander babble.

He hadn’t managed it.

“It’s an apocalypse.” And if that didn’t win today’s prize for statement of the bleeding obvious, he didn’t know what would.

“What do we have to do?” That was Oz, again, straight to the point.

“Didn’t you call Buff? And Willow?” Xander, and he opened his mouth to snap, and caught himself. Actually, it was a perfectly reasonable question.

“They can’t help.”

“They can’t? Why not?”

“They’re women. Women can’t help this time.”

Xander glanced from Giles to Oz. “Yay! A chance for male bonding and apocalypse averting which doesn’t include PMS and strappy shoes. ‘Kay. Like the wolfman says, what do we have to do?” 

And that _was_ the question, wasn’t it?

“I, you, what we, I mean to say...” He was going to take the protective coating off his spectacle lenses in a minute if he kept cleaning them like this. He didn’t know why he ever paid extra for that; given that he broke a pair every two months in a fight, it was a dead waste of money. He never kept them long enough to scratch them. He had long since stopped buying expensive frames; the Council’s (admittedly generous) medical insurance didn’t cover his glasses and the company accountant, a middle-aged Ulsterwoman even more terrifying than most of the undead and with an impenetrable accent, refused to countenance expense claims for more than two pairs per year. Watchers weren’t supposed to fight.

Oz tipped his head fractionally to one side and raised his eyebrows a quarter of an inch, the equivalent of three minutes of major interrogation from anybody else. Xander opened his mouth, presumably for the aforementioned three minutes, and Giles cut in hastily.

“It’s a sex spell.”

And way to go, as the children would have said, on the sensible and logical explanation.

“Somebody has to have sex?”

He thought he had just said that.

“I’m liking it already.” That, of course was Xander. “Unless it’s uncool demon sex. Just saying, read about it in your books, Giles, don’t want to do it with anything tentacled and icky... is that too much information?”

“Yes,” Giles and Oz said in concert.

“’Kay. Give us the detail, Giles, and not too much detail about it, and that sentence made way more sense in my head. Who has to have sex, and who with? And please let it be a who and not a what.”

He was working up to a major headache. “It’s a who. It’s two whos.”

“One of them’s an owl?”

He snapped. “Just shut _up_ , Xander. This is hard... this is difficult enough without you interrupting with silly jokes.” He fought off remorse as Xander's expression went closed and tight; he _knew_ the boy had only been trying to keep things light, to make it easy. “Both of them are men.”

Xander's mouth fell open. Oz’s eyebrows went up another quarter inch; Giles, having got the main heading across, went for the exposition.

“The counterspell requires that a male virgin shall have sex with another man. And I’m sorry to involve you both, but as you can no doubt see if you give your minds to it, the potential candidates whom I could approach without being arrested or expecting a punch in the mouth are limited.”

Well, it was worth the embarrassment just to see that for once he had silenced Xander, who was gaping like a goldfish.

“Ah. On the virginity clause, Giles, I’m not eligible.” That was Oz. Xander stopped doing the goldfish impression.

“Um, me neither. I know it seems unlikely, but there has been a girl willing to take the risk, although as a matter of fact all the risk was on my side and maybe I should just shut up now?”

He shook his head. “I, I rather assumed... well, I knew... I guessed that. It’s not the, the significant point. The, the provisions of the spell are quite specific. It doesn’t matter what you’ve done with women. What matters is whether you’ve done it with, with another man. If you haven’t, you count as a virgin. One of the parties needs, needs to be a virgin. The status of the second doesn’t matter.” He ran out of steam again.

Oz shrugged. “Sorry, Giles, still not eligible.”

Giles admitted privately to being surprised; Xander managed nothing private about it. “You’ve... you’re gay? But... what about Willow?”

Oz looked calmly at him. “I’m not gay. There was a guy at a gig came onto me. I was... curious.” He looked down and smiled reminiscently. “There was some good stuff going round that night. Somebody had been... forget where, and brought back some stuff. Nothing nasty, but real good joints being shared around. Somebody gave me one and it was just enough to make everything possible. Just enough that when he asked, I thought ‘why not, just to see?’ Did see. Tried both ways, could see how it could be good, if that’s your vibe.” He glanced at Giles, conspiratorially. He did know, then. Giles had thought he did. “Not for me. Not sorry I tried, you know? It’s different, a man’s body. Planes rather than curves, and you _know_ what feels good rather than having to find out. Was O.K. when I did him, felt weird when he did me. Not sorry I tried, but never felt the urge to try again. Guys don’t do it for me.”

Xander's mouth hung open. “You had gay sex because you were _stoned_? Just because...”

“Because I thought it might be fun, yeah. And it _was_ fun, but not to try again. And I wasn’t really stoned. Like I say, just enough to make everything possible.” He glanced at Giles. “Ya know?”

“I do,” agreed Giles, half lost in reminiscences of his own. “God, I did exactly that. _Exactly_ that. Big joint at a gig, and a man who... and I thought, ‘well, why not, if I don’t like it I needn’t ever do it again.’”

“But you did like it,” said Oz with conviction. Xander was back at the goldfish stage.

“Loved it. As you say, it feels quite different from being with a woman.”

Xander whimpered. “ _You_ had gay sex because you were stoned?”

Giles glared at him. “What’s causing you the trouble? That I’ve had sex – because actually, Xander, I don’t discriminate between straight sex and gay sex, it’s all mutual pleasure, at least it is if you’re doing it right, and I like both – or that I’ve been stoned? I’ll grant you I missed the sixties, I was too young, but the seventies in London had a lot going on too.”       

“Yeah but...” There was a moment’s silence and then Xander said quietly, “Oh God. That means it’s me.”

“You, you’ve never...?” Fairly obviously he hadn’t, but it seemed polite – and sensible – to verify it.

Xander shook his head. He looked sick.

“And are you willing? I, I wouldn’t ask but, but I can’t think of anybody else.” The colour was continuing to drain from Xander's face; the very idea was obviously terrifying.

“With...” Xander swallowed hard. “With you?”

Oh. The terror was possibly as much the notion of it being Giles as the idea at all. “It doesn’t have to be with me, no,” he said carefully. “If you know somebody else... it could be arranged so that they wouldn’t need to know why, but then it would be wholly up to you to make it happen.”

“Only person I _know_ know was Larry, and he’s dead.”

 Giles let his glance slip to Oz. “Well, or, Oz, could you, I understand that it’s not your preference, but could, could you...?”

Oz nodded. “Could manage the mechanics, sure, but I gotta say, Xander, I think if Giles is willing, you’d do better with him.”

The glance Xander threw at Giles was filled with such sick misery that Giles couldn’t bear it.

“Xander... it doesn’t need to be instantly. You don’t even need to decide instantly. We have a week. Any time within that week, we can start, start the ritual. It’s quite straightforward: it nominates you as the,” _victim, sacrifice, “_ the volunteer. And then you have until, until dawn on Monday to complete the, the, the... So you have time to decide if you can do it at all, and then you have time to decide who you want to, to...”

“Yeah, ‘cause neither of you is keen.”

Hell. He’d thought they were giving Xander choices; it had sounded to Xander as if they were trying to nominate each other to get out of a distasteful duty themselves. His glance crossed with Oz’s, who had plainly heard the same thing.

“I, I can’t speak for Oz, obviously, and I admit that I have, that the idea of, that an unwilling partner is not my, my... Xander, if you wanted me to, to, I would view it as an honour. I just assumed that you would prefer someone closer to your own age. I know that you don’t think of me as, as...” As a potential lover, being as you’re less than half my age and straight. As a friend, even. As anything other than Buffy’s boring, critical, bossy Watcher.

Xander gaped at him and then shot a glance at Oz.

“You want me to, Xan, I will. Told you, it’s not my thing, but I’ve done it and I know I can. But it’s _not_ my thing, and I’ve only done it once, and I was... not stoned but hazy. Technique didn’t matter much to me, which was of the good because I don’t think either of us had any. You want somebody who knows what they’re doing, who can make it good for you.”

Giles winced. That assumed that it _could_ be made good for Xander, which was by no means certain. Xander was straight and Giles didn’t think he was particularly open-minded; he couldn’t imagine Xander taking Oz’s relaxed view of being propositioned and thinking ‘well, why not?’ And that was definitely going to be a problem.

Xander thought so too. “Do I have to... is it just... we’re talking about fourth base, here, yeah?”

“Yes.” Giles made it as unemotional as he could. “I can... you can read the translation, if you like, see what’s involved. And, and, if you want to take a copy of the original, get a second opinion...”

Xander scoffed. “Yeah. Get it from who?”

“Whom,” corrected Giles, absently. “Well, well, Willow might be able to, I don’t know how much of Quanzul she, she... Probably not. I know a man in England who could, who could, and there’s an ex-Watcher in Tokyo who could do it. We could fax it over.”

“And I’m supposed to trust somebody I’ve never heard of to say whether or not I gotta take one for the team?”

He had no answer to that, but Oz tipped his head to one side – so _much_ of his body language now was canine – and pointed out, “Giles is just giving you a choice. Question is really whether or not you trust _him_ to have done the research right.”

Xander was silent for a moment, worrying at a loose thread on his cuff. “Yeah. Yeah, I guess I do. If research-guy says this is what I have to do, then I guess I do. Giles doesn’t get it wrong, not about that sort of thing.”

Giles was startled. It might have been less than gracefully worded, but it was actually a stunning declaration of faith, and not one he would ever have expected – certainly not from Xander.

“I wish I did,” he said honestly. “But I’m certain, Xander. The text is, is, well, fairly blatant. I, I’ll show you.”

He had thought it might come to this, and had taken more care than usual to make his writing legible. Xander's hand shook as he accepted the paper, but after a moment, he thrust it blindly at Oz. “I can’t... just tell me, yeah?”

Giles opened his mouth, but Oz frowned at him, and he subsided again, while Oz glanced through the text, and then settled to read it again properly.

“There’s a spell to do first. That’s what Giles said, right? Sets you up as the...” The word in the text was ‘sacrifice’, which was what Giles had written, but Oz picked up what he had said. “Volunteer. The spell sorta draws you to the attention of whatever’s running the show. And then like Giles says, there’s a breathing space, and any time before the deadline...” He read on. “Yeah, it requires a full on fuck.”

Both Xander and Giles jumped; Oz didn’t generally use such words, but Giles was suddenly grateful. He couldn’t possibly have said that himself, not to these two, but Oz was right: this needed to be expressed in the language they would understand, and so that there could be no possibility of misunderstanding.

“You’ve gotta be the one being fucked, Xander, not the other way round, and the important thing is that you’ve gotta come.”

Xander hid his face in his hands, but his ears were scarlet, and Giles’ could feel the heat in his own face. Oz read on. “And so does the person who’s doing it with you. He’s gotta come in you, or the whole thing doesn’t count, is that it?” He lifted his eyes to Giles, who nodded.

“Yes. But, but, there’s a, a problem.”

“Only one?” came from behind Xander's hands. Giles made a face, but he kept his eyes on Oz.

“This sort of spell – they’re not precisely common, but they turn up every now and then. They’re old, all of them, and a lot of them are to do with bloodlines – well, and blood magic generally. The ones involving girls are: very often the idea is not just to take a girl’s virginity but to get her pregnant. There’s, there’s a legend that the first Slayer and the first Watcher were twins, from a coupling of that type. The, the, a spell of this type, though, where both the parties are men, that’s more to do with transitional rituals, coming of age, rites of passage.” He hesitated. “Very often the two people involved would be, would be related. Closely related.”

Oz tipped his head the other way. “Closely?”

Giles shut his eyes. “You have to remember that modern morality is, well, modern.”

“We talking descriptive morality or normative morality here, Giles?” Oz grinned at Giles’ surprise. “I took the ethics class.”

“I’m not taking classes at all,” bit out Xander. “Giles, what are you talking about? I’m not liking this, and I’m really not liking you talking about blood.”

“It’s not spilled blood, not in this case at least. This spell is a rite of passage spell,” said Giles plainly. “The point of it is to push you through into adulthood and to, to imbue you with the, the skills, the abilities, you need as an adult, and, and more specifically, as a warrior. A fighter. Originally, the, the postulant, the novice, the, the probationer would be presented for the ritual by an older man who would say that he was worthy to be accounted an adult. That would very often be his father or his uncle. And the sex element was to transfer the, the essence of adulthood from the older man to the younger.”

Xander blanched again. “That is so... my _father_?” He shook his head. “Or Uncle Rory. O.K., suddenly you two look like very much better options for Prom Night if I’m gonna have to put out at the end of it.”

“Thank you,” said Giles, drily. “I’m sure you can count on either of us to take you to dinner and buy you flowers. Of course there’s more to it than that – that would be an ordinary tribal ritual, not on the apocalyptic scale. This one, it’s not just you who has to make it to adulthood, it’s, it’s everybody. You’re just the representative.”

“Giles?” Oz looked puzzled. “If it’s a coming of age thing, then... I’m not older than Xander. Well, only a few months.”

Giles shook his head. “I don’t think it would matter that much. I think, I think the fact that you’ve fought would be sufficient. Well, actually, I’ve been largely disregarding the whole battle-scarred warrior element on the grounds that we’ve all done that and none of us could be considered inexperienced.”

“Then what’s... you said there was a problem.” Xander again.

Giles sighed. “The problem is the... purpose. The transfer of, of... It’s got to be an actual transfer. So... whoever you choose, they can’t use a condom.”

Xander stared, and then gave a cracked laugh. “God. I hadn’t even thought of that. Guess I’m not really ready for the whole gay sex experience, am I?” He glanced from Giles to Oz, slightly desperately.

“Might have been hazy, but not that hazy,” offered Oz. “I used one. No reason to think I’m not clean.”

Giles hesitated and Xander's eyes narrowed. “I... was less than careful when I was young. The risks in those days were... different. But I had a complete medical before I came to America, and anything since then, I’ve been careful. Well, even before that, I had become careful.” God, this was embarrassing, but Xander had a right to know. “Crabs once, and a general infection once, which cleared with antibiotics. Both of them twenty years ago. Nothing since. I think, I believe I’m clean.” He forced himself to meet Xander's gaze. “I, I wouldn’t suggest, I wouldn’t offer if I thought I would be putting you in any danger. _Any_ danger.”

Xander hesitated for a moment in his turn and then nodded once. “’Kay. So... I gotta take it up the ass with one of you – yeah, I know, or somebody else, but there isn’t anybody else and we all know it – and it’s gotta be bareback, and we both gotta come and that saves the world, right?”

“Yes,” said Giles flatly. “Literally. It’s not a small apocalypse, always assuming there were any such thing. It’s a bloody big ending-of-it-all, overrun-by-demons, blood-and-flames, everything-falling-into-the-void, multi-dimensional apocalypse. You’re not going to be saving just this world, you’ll be saving all the other ones as well. It’s just bad luck that the saving has to be done from this world, or it would be somebody else’s problem.”

Xander snorted. “Like we would trust anybody else to do it right? And oh merciful God, did I just say that? You seriously want _me_ to save the world? Giles, you _know_ this is a bad idea. You know I’ll screw it up, and that could have been better phrased, but you _know_ I will. Something will go wrong.”

“Nothing will go wrong. I, I’ll do the first part of the spell, the invocation. There is nothing that you have to do after that, except, except, nothing magical, or, or...” He hoped he sounded convincing, because he didn’t feel convinced.

“Yeah. Right. Earth to Giles, this is _Xander_ we’re talking about. Xander who can screw up just about anything, even things he’s done before, and by definition, this isn’t something I’ve done before.”

Giles looked at his hands. “Xander, I have every confidence in your ability to do it. I do, I do understand that you’re not willing. I _do_ understand that, that this is a shocking concept for a straight man, particularly given that you can’t just lie back and think of England – America – because you’ve got to, to... we have to find a way to make it, to make it acceptable to you. I’m sorry that I can’t offer you a better choice than Oz or me. I can promise you that if you choose me, I’ll make it as quick and, and straightforward as I can, and I can promise you that afterwards, none of us will mention it. It’s not something I would choose to do, and I think it’s fair to say that Oz feels the same way. I _know_ it’s not something you would choose to do. But I’m afraid you put your finger on it: there is nobody else. It’s you, and your choice is Oz or me.”

There was a long silence, finally broken by Oz. “Look guys, was sorta hoping not to have to get to this, but obviously neither of you... I just think that it would be a deal easier if you stopped lying to each other. And possibly also to yourselves.”

They both gaped at him. He fidgeted. “’Kay, if you’re not gonna say it, I am. Xander, you’re not straight. Or not totally straight. You’ve been eyeing the boys as well as the girls as long as I’ve known you. I’m thinking maybe this would be a good time to move past the denial?”

Giles felt his mouth fall open. Oz turned to him. “And you’ve been watching Xander any time since graduation. When he comes in, your heart speeds up, your stammer gets worse, you’re throwing out signals so loud I’m half deafened by them. The only person louder with the signals is Xander and why the hell neither of you can hear the other is a mystery to me.”

Xander made a small sound along the lines of ‘meep’. Giles sympathised. “I, I, I, what makes you think, how do you... what?”

“The wolf knows,” said Oz placidly, or possibly it was ‘the wolf’s nose’, Giles wasn’t sure. “You two are hot for each other and have been these last six months.”


	2. Life's A Bitch, Giles

Well. Yes. Right. That was... he thought... he... Xander... Oz...

Good grief, he was even stammering when he _thought_ , now, as well as when he spoke.

He managed to tear his gaze away from Oz, and to look at Xander – and wished he hadn’t. Xander's expression was shifting between mortification and despair.

It wasn’t true, then. For about half a second he had allowed himself to hope.

“Xander...” He started, and found that he had no idea, no idea _at all_ , of what to say. “Oz...”

“Yeah, I’m sure,” said Oz, still placid. “Hormones, ya know?”

He didn’t know, but he could see the probability. And... oh! Since Oz was right about Giles – no point in denying it to himself, however much he had thought that he was hiding it from everybody else, and the hope uncurled itself again – he had no reason to assume that Oz was wrong about Xander. Well, except for the denial.

He looked again at Xander, who felt his gaze and turned his head away.

“Xander?” It came out more gently than he had ever spoken to Xander before, he thought, but Xander still wouldn’t look at him. Wouldn’t look at either of them. He got up, ignoring Oz completely, and looked over the top of Giles’ head.

“I get the apocalypse thing.” His voice was a little too loud and not completely steady. “I’ll do it. Giles, if you... I can... we’ll need to talk about it. You’ll have to tell me what to do because I’ve never... well, you know I’ve never, that’s the whole point, yeah? But not right now. You said I could have some time, yeah? I... I can’t think about it right now. I’ll see you later.”

He had his hand on the door and slipped out without looking back; Giles could think of no way to stop him.

There was an uncomfortable silence. At least, Giles thought it was uncomfortable. He didn’t know what Oz thought. He suddenly realised that he had never known what Oz thought.

“That was not kind,” he said suddenly.

“No,” agreed Oz, still placid. “But it was necessary.”

He was surprised. “ _Necessary_?”

Oz frowned at him; suddenly he felt that Oz was the adult, and that Giles had disappointed him by failing to understand. “You were going to dance round each other for ever and Xander was going to end up choosing me, not because he wanted to, but because he was afraid of choosing you.”

“But if he didn’t _want_ to choose me... and you told him you would... Oz, that was _not_ kind.”

Oz had that ‘come on, you can do better than that’ expression again. He recognised it; he wore the same expression himself, often, speaking to Buffy. Very often, speaking to Xander. “Giles, he _likes_ you. You like him. So O.K., this apocalypse thing, difficult for both of you, but still gotta be better than involving me. The sex has to be good for him or hey, demons. I don’t know how to do that; you do.”

“But if he wanted to choose you...”

“He didn’t. Not really. He only even thought about it because he was scared of you finding out that he likes you. And because he thinks that you don’t like him. I mean that you don’t like him _and_ you don’t _like_ him, like him.”

“Either way, it was supposed to be his choice,” iterated Giles stubbornly. “You’ve effectively taken that away from him.”

Oz shook his head. “If he digs his heels in and says he won’t have you – and come on, Giles, you can’t tell me that even knowing what you know, you won’t offer him the choice – I’ll do it. I said I would. But he would rather have you because he likes you, and it would be better for him to have you, because that way the rest of us are less likely to be over-run by demons. Actually trying to avert an apocalypse here, Giles, not just trying to get you laid. Or him. The apocalypse is more important.”

He cocked his head again, and Giles suddenly understood: this was the wolf. The easiest answer _was_ the right one for an animal that lived in the moment. For the apocalypse to be averted, Xander had to get laid. Xander liked Giles, Giles liked Xander, Giles knew how to make the sex good for Xander, so obviously Giles was the one to have sex with Xander. Why did it need to be more complicated that that? Emotional complication was what humans did – not what wolves did. Oz, normally, had human emotions, but Oz in danger, Oz facing the apocalypse, was the wolf.

He didn’t like it, but he felt better for understanding it. Oz saw his comprehension, and nodded at him. “Now you see.”

He was silent for a moment. “I’m so bloody tired of sacrifices,” he said, suddenly. “I’m so tired of having to ask for willing sacrifices. Buffy, every time she goes out. Every time I want her to patrol instead of being a cheerleader, or, or just being ordinary. Of asking her to give up being sixteen or eighteen, or being somewhere other than here. Asking her to give up... Angel.” His voice thickened on that one. “I knew, I _knew_ as soon as she met Angel that it was going to end in tears.”

“Worse for you than for her.”

Giles shrugged. “If she hadn’t been the Slayer she would never have met him. I didn’t make her the Slayer but I’m part of the whole thing. I set her up as the sacrifice, over and over. Every time I send her out, and then the whole Cruciamentum thing, and... And all you bloody kids at your graduation... How many of your year are dead, Oz? And now I’m sacrificing Xander too.”

“We haven’t got a choice, Giles. I’m not a virgin; Xander is. There’s nobody else. It’s him.”

“It needn’t be. I, I can go elsewhere. It needn’t be Sunnydale. I, I know Los Angeles has a fairly lively reputation, but there must be a virgin or two there, wouldn’t you think? I, I’ve got a week.”

“Yeah? Come on, Giles, not gonna work. You’ve gotta find him. You’ve gotta get him into bed, _without_ him thinking the whole spell thing is weird. Where are you gonna go?”

Giles shrugged. “Clubs.”

“Yeah? You think you can find a virgin in a night club, and persuade him to put out? How are you gonna be sure he’s a virgin?”

“The spell will tell me afterwards. And if he’s not, I, I’ll just have to go on and, and find one who is.”

Oz shook his head. “Look, I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but even I can see, it’s not gonna work. Giles, you’re gonna pick up some boy you don’t know, and persuade him to let you fuck him, no rubber? O.K., they didn’t cover apocalypses in health class, but even I know: if he’s willing to have you with no protection, he’s not a virgin, and he’s probably not clean. Xander’s both.”

“I will not, I will _not_ ,” snarled Giles, suddenly furious, “sacrifice another one of you _children_. Look, I can find a boy in L.A. And I can be bloody persuasive when I try.”

Oz just looked at him. “Really?”

“If I have to. And if he’s difficult, well, I’ve got size on my side.” He sounded defiant, but Oz was just gazing at him, face serious.

“So you won’t sacrifice Xander – and Xander understands what’s at stake, he can have an opinion about it – but you’ll sacrifice another boy? You talking about force, Giles?”

“I, I, I...”

“You talking about rape? Because that’s what it sounds like. And to be sure he’s a virgin, you’ll have to pick one who’s _very_ young. Can you actually do that?”

“You don’t know what I can do,” he muttered bitterly.

“Don’t suppose I do, not to _know_. And hey, apocalypse coming, bad choices all round. But I know what the wolf knows about you: I’ve smelled violence on you but I’ve never smelled vice.”

Giles looked away. “I have more than a passing acquaintance with vice.”

“Back in the day, maybe. And maybe I don’t mean depravity. Could believe that of you. But viciousness? Cruelty? To Angelus, yeah, maybe, and to your friend Ethan, yeah, maybe, but that’s when they’re a risk to Buffy. Or to the rest of us? You keep talking about us as children. Cruelty to a child? You haven’t got it in you. A very young boy, Giles? You gonna be able to get him off? Because you would have to. You gonna be able to get off yourself? You have to. You’re wincing, Giles. Can you get it up like that? You told Xander you weren’t keen on an unwilling partner.”

He had nothing to say to that. Oz nodded again.

“Anyway, even if you could, I won’t let you sacrifice somebody else that way.”

“Do you think you could take me down?” It was growled.

Oz considered. “Not sure. Maybe. But Buffy and I together could, and believe me, Giles, if it comes to it, I’ll tell her. Because,” and his voice softened, “the other person who doesn’t deserve to be sacrificed is you. Giles, I know you’ve done some stuff that didn’t come out well for you, but you’re not gonna sleep well at night thinking you’ve forced some kid you don’t know.”

“And I am if it’s Xander?”

“Xander's of age, and he understands what you’re asking him. Xander says he’s willing.”

“Jesuitry. He can’t say no.”

“ _Neither can you_. Look, I get that you Brits think that Americans are way too inclined to think that we’re victims, but I think you’re taking it a bit far the other way. If Xander's a victim, so are you. And if you think you can get past that yourself, then do him the justice of thinking that he understands what he’s saying yes to. Life’s a bitch, Giles. But it’s still better than the alternative.”

Restful. Had he ever said that Oz was restful? He must have been out of his mind. But... the arguments were laid out before him, and Oz... Oz was right. They had no choice. Or none to signify: the only choice was Xander's: Giles or Oz.

He closed his eyes, and surrendered. “I’ll, I’ll tell him you’re still willing if that’s what he wants.”

“Good. It’ll be O.K., Giles, you’ll see. See you around, yeah?” And he too was gone, leaving Giles wearily pensive. Oz was... Oz was not at all what he had been thinking. He had been thinking of Oz as... He needed to remember that Oz was no longer _entirely_ human – and therefore that Oz’s mindset was no longer _entirely_ human. He would have to be careful not to make assumptions about Oz.

He would have to be careful not to make assumptions about _anyone_. That stupid little cliché about not assuming was, like so many clichés, heavily based in fact. He had been completely off target with Xander. That was...

Well, what was it? He leaned back in his chair and thought about it. It was a huge surprise. He had thought that his gaydar – he disliked the word, but there was no denying that it filled a gap – was better than that. He might put it down to the fact that it was not at all unusual for a young man of Xander's age still to be a little undecided as to his sexuality but... he forced himself to be honest. Because of how he felt about Xander, he had been refusing to allow himself to look at or think about the boy – the young man – any more than he absolutely had to. He accused himself of unkindness; he remembered only too well the confusion and unhappiness which went with discovery of his own sexual identity, and he didn’t suppose that it was any easier for Xander, even in a culture more accepting of such things – and with a considerably more liberal legal framework – than had been the case for Giles. Giles had been in revolt against more or less all of his family’s values, so one more revolt had been minor, and observance of the legal age of consent in London when he had been Xander's age had been sketchy among the young men of his acquaintance and inclination. But for all that, he had been deeply unhappy until he had found a way to reconcile his nature with his upbringing – and he didn’t suppose that Xander felt any differently. Tony Harris didn’t strike Giles as somebody likely to be sympathetic to anything other than sexual conformity, and Xander must have been desperate for a sympathetic ear. Giles could have offered him that, even if it would have cost him something to have held back any suggestion of his own interest.

Very well. Xander was interested in men. Giles had missed that fact. But Xander was interested in _Giles_? That was a horse of a _totally_ different colour. Giles hadn’t just missed that: he was having trouble even now processing the concept. He had always assumed that Xander's more or less constant presence was to do with his friendships with Buffy and Willow – and his desire for those friendships to be something more. And of course, now that he thought about it, that was arrant nonsense. There was nothing in Xander's relationship with Buffy that would have him sorting books, however ineptly, in Giles’ flat. The boy should have been hanging around the college, not hovering in Giles’ sitting room.

Some bloody Watcher Giles was.

He picked up the phone. Even discounting an apocalypse – dear Lord, what was he _saying_? – he needed to talk to Xander.

Xander was not at home.

Xander was not at Buffy’s.

Willow didn’t know where Xander was.

Giles glanced out of the window. It would be sunset in an hour, and Xander knew the risks of being out after dark, but he had been upset when he had left. Giles would be surprised if the boy didn’t have a stake on him – they all carried one as a matter of course – but... He picked up his car keys.

Supremely pointless, he told himself, as he started the engine. Xander could be anywhere. He had no idea where to start looking for the boy.

He found him at the third attempt, in the park, sitting on a swing and staring blankly into space. When Giles crossed his field of view he blinked, and dipped his head, but he didn’t speak.

Giles, wise for once, didn’t speak either. He simply sat on the next swing, facing the other way. Xander never dealt well with silence, and Giles could wait.

He didn’t have to wait long.

“Do you want to... do the spell now?” Xander sounded utterly defeated.

“No.”

Xander's head went a little lower; Giles wasn’t sure why. He straightened his legs, and allowed the swing to move a little, just rocking slowly, and waited again.

“I said I would do it.”

“You did. Thank you.”

“So...”

“So we have time.”

“Oh.”

Giles pushed a little harder, leaned back and let the swing move. When he looked sideways again, Xander was staring at him.

“What’s the matter, never seen a Watcher in a playground before?”

 He was relieved to get a smile, however brief. He turned his own head away and spoke to the metal support beside him.

“Oz was telling the truth about me. I, I missed you desperately when you went away in the summer; if I had known you were stuck in Oxnard I would have come for you. You, you probably wouldn’t have thanked me for it.”

Xander was silent for a moment before starting his own swing moving. “You never said.”

“Neither did you,” pointed out Giles, reasonably. “But no, I didn’t. How many reasons do you want? I, I had no reason to believe that it would have been welcome, and I wouldn’t have embarrassed you on the off-chance. I wouldn’t have embarrassed myself either: I was embarrassed enough already.”

“Yeah, ‘cause I’m not the great catch.” Xander slipped off the swing and stood with his back turned. Giles stilled his own swing and turned.

“Actually, because of me, not because of you. Because I’m more than twice your age and I thought you would think me ridiculous. Because yearning after somebody you can’t have is always ridiculous, and a gay man yearning after a straight one is even more ridiculous. But, but in terms of what Oz said – that I’ve wanted you any time this past six months – yes, that’s true. And Xander, it needn’t affect you at all. If you don’t feel that way about men, if Oz is wrong, or if you don’t feel that way about me, well, then, ‘men have died from time to time, and worms have eaten them, but not for love’. Or if you prefer the Stones to Shakespeare, ‘you can’t always get what you want’. I am quite accustomed to that and I won’t mention it again.”

“I just... I don’t know what I want.” It was filled with desperation, and Giles’ heart turned over. He got up in his turn, and wandered past Xander towards the see-saw, sitting on the pivot point and looking back at Xander, who followed him.

“I’m sorry. I can’t even give you any more time to work it out. All I can say is, I won’t take what has to be done now as, as... I won’t assume that it means anything for the future. And I am to tell you that, that you still have the option of choosing Oz.”

Xander straddled the see-saw, and flipped a hand to send Giles back towards the other end; there was a moment of adjustment before he found the distance which would allow him to balance Xander's lighter frame.

“Can we do the spell soon? Tonight? Just... I think it might be easier with the first part done. I might wig less if I know I’m committed.”

He nodded, words tangling in his throat.

“And then... I don’t want Oz. But... I don’t think I can do the, the whole thing tonight, Giles. I’m... I’ve never even touched a guy. Not that way.”

“If you like,” he said, cautiously, “we could go and do the spell now. The nomination. And Xander, it’s just a nomination. It doesn’t hurt. It commits you to the, the deed, but it doesn’t commit you to me. You can still change your mind and choose Oz. Or anybody else if you think of another... And maybe we could, you could, you could accustom yourself to the idea of touching me, of, of me touching you. I, I wouldn’t do anything you didn’t like.” God, he sounded self-righteous; he could hear echoes of himself at sixteen, trying to persuade his girlfriend to let him touch her breasts, and Xander obviously heard that too, because he made an odd sound of amusement.

“You suggesting we make out on your couch?”

“Would it help?” He asked it in all seriousness, and watched the amusement slip away from Xander's face.

“Yeah. Yeah, it might.”

“Then, given that it will be dark soon, shall we go home and discuss it?”

He steadied the see-saw courteously as Xander climbed off, pretending not to hear the indrawn breath, pretending not to see Xander gathering his courage.

“Yeah. Let’s do that.”


	3. Are we Seeing A Trend Here?

God alone knew what was going on in Xander's head; Giles was confused enough off his own bat. Back in the flat, Xander stood looking around as if he had never been there before while Giles gathered the materials he needed for the spell. When he came back, he thought that Xander flinched; that was not promising.

“It, it’s quite straightforward,” he said, as reassuringly as he could, turning back the rug. “I’m just going to make a rough circle with salt – it doesn’t have to be precise – and light a candle. You stand in the circle holding the candle, I’ll say the spell, and when I stop – I’ll nod at you – you say your name. Your whole name, please, first and middle and surname. Then, then you blow out the candle and that’s all.”

“Should be easy enough.” Xander was trying to sound steady and confident, but when he held out his hand for the candle, the flame wavered as his fingers shook. Giles pretended not to see, turning away to pick up his notes.

“Ready?

He got a single jerky nod, and for a fraction of a second thought about saying ‘no, you needn’t do this, I’ll find somebody else’ before tamping it down. He had already _been_ through this with Oz. There was nobody else. There was no option any more ethical than this one. Xander understood what he was doing. He began to speak, feeling the unspoken undertone of power, tasting the faint tang of magic in the air. He nodded at Xander, who spoke his name, with greater conviction than Giles had expected, and who blew out the candle without needing to be reminded.

Then they stood looking at each other.

“That’s it?” asked Xander, finally. Giles nodded, taking the candle from him and replacing it on the shelf.

“I’ll just sweep up the salt.”

He made all tidy again, tipping the salt into the kitchen bin, and then looked at Xander who was standing rather helplessly watching.

 “I could, I could make us something to eat?” It was his default suggestion to Xander: he struggled to find a way to interact with him, and always had, and food was an easy get-out, but Xander shook his head. He looked uneasy again.

“Then...?” He backed away to the sitting room, Xander following, neither of them knowing how to make it to the next Big Thing. They stood, looking stupidly at each other for a moment; Xander suddenly cast a terrified glance at the couch and Giles realised that he _had_ to act, and act at once.

“Don’t look so scared. I won’t hurt you, I won’t do anything... if you don’t like what I’m doing, say so.” He was reaching forward as he spoke, taking Xander's hand, pulling gently to bring him closer. Xander's other hand flailed for a moment; then he plainly got a grip on his thoughts, and set it lightly on Giles’ waist, and tipped his head up in obvious, if nervous, invitation.

Control. Control, control, control. Giles wanted nothing more than to grab, to take Xander's mouth hard – he mustn’t. Control. He set his lips to Xander's as delicately as he could: light, closed mouth kisses. He felt Xander tremble, but he didn’t pull away, and Giles dared to ask for more, easing his mouth open and tracing his tongue along Xander's lip. Xander shivered again, but his mouth opened. Gently, Giles. Gently. He coaxed, rather than demanding: light kisses rather than the full on snog he wanted. His free hand settled on Xander's jaw. Gently. Gently. He let go of Xander's hand, slid his arm around Xander's waist. Gently. Slowly. Tongue to the lip again, asking for access. Being granted it, and exploring slowly, tongue tip to tongue tip and slow, wet open-mouthed kisses. Nothing more. He kept his hands still. God, this was hot. Xander had never done this... and that thought nearly cost him his self-control. He pulled back.

“All right?”

He got a nod, and Xander coloured hotly. Oh God, he wouldn’t be able to hold back with Xander looking like that, and he must, he must. Seducing a virgin had never been one of his fantasies, but he could be persuaded. He mustn’t let it get away from him, he had to be gentle. The problem would be keeping himself from going too fast. No. Not even that. The problem would be keeping his word about not making any assumptions for the future. He closed in again, fingers light on Xander's cheek, teasing softly to persuade Xander to open his mouth again. Heady stuff. He let his hand slip down to Xander's neck, his shoulder, his back, stroking slowly down and up. Not going anywhere adventurous, not yet.

When Xander broke away, Giles let him go, but he didn’t retreat far. His chest was heaving as if he had been doing something much more difficult than simply allowing himself to be kissed, and his expression was half way from pleasure to bewilderment. Giles wanted to ask him again if everything was all right, but it felt stupid. He took a step backward, towards the couch, his hand out to encourage Xander to follow, and when Xander did follow, Giles rewarded him with another slow, easy kiss. They slid to the couch; Giles worked an arm around Xander's waist to steady him, and caught himself about to push. He wanted to get Xander on his back, to mouth at his neck, to unbutton his shirt and explore Xander's chest, but...

No. No. He _had_ to go at Xander's pace. He had to stop thinking that this was his seduction, had to allow Xander to run the show. He leaned back himself, sliding against the cushions, drawing Xander with him. Xander on top. Xander in charge. Only Xander showed no sign of wanting to take charge. Giles slipped his fingers down Xander's back again, careful that it should be a caress, not a, a, a restraint. Slowly. Keep it slow. Xander was willing to kiss; then they would kiss. Giles caught his hand wandering down towards Xander's arse, and sent it back upwards, round Xander's ribs, the other hand tangling in his hair, fingering slowly through the softness of it, stroking his scalp, working round to his ear. He traced the curve, asked wordlessly for Xander to turn his head, and let his mouth follow his fingertip over the sensitive skin, sucking the lobe gently into his mouth and nipping it lightly. Xander made an odd little noise, and pulled away for an instant, before coming tentatively back.

“Don’t like that?”

“I do...” It was whispered; Giles smiled.

“Shall I do it some more?” He didn’t wait for an answer, just let his fingers ease Xander's hair away from the other ear, and nibbled gently. Xander shivered again. Giles eased his mouth lower, against Xander's neck. This couldn’t be new to him, surely; Giles had opened doors in the school more than once to find Xander and Cordelia ensconced inside, and the uncomfortable dealings between Xander and Willow had not passed him by. Then there had been Ampata, and Miss French, and, if he had guessed correctly, Faith, and Anya, and Xander was not a total virgin. So why was this affecting him so much, when he must have done it before?

He turned his head a little, and his jaw rasped against Xander's. That was why. Because it was different. Xander couldn’t deceive himself that the mouth touching him belonged to a woman, and he wasn’t ready to accept that it belonged to a man. 

He must go slowly. Just kiss him. Touch his back, touch his arms. Leave his chest for tomorrow. Don’t try to get inside his clothes. Nothing below the waist. Giles gathered his thoughts and exerted iron control: Xander's weight was lying across his body, and he must _not_ shift. If Xander knew that Giles was hard, that was all to the good, but Giles must _not_ thrust against him. He wasn’t ready for that. Xander was... was hardening, but he wasn’t there yet, and every time Giles moved, he could feel Xander losing whatever confidence had been there before. Gently. They had all the time in the world.

Three days and Giles was desperate enough to call Oz. It was humiliating; it would be humiliating for Xander when he found out, and he would have to find out, and it was the only thing he could think of to avert the bloody apocalypse.

He was there a good fifteen minutes early, nursing a cup of coffee he didn’t want, going over and over what he needed to say. When Oz, armed with his own cup of coffee, slipped into the seat opposite, Giles forgot his carefully edited script and just blurted, Xander fashion, the first thought in his head.

“Are you _sure_ that Xander's not straight?”

An eyebrow went up that quarter inch again.

“Certain.”

“Then... Oz, can you, can you, you’ll need to, it’s not working. I can’t, he doesn’t, I think you’ll have to.”

There was a moment’s silence, in which Oz looked at him curiously.

“Giles? You’re gonna have to finish at least one of those sentences, because at the moment I don’t get what you’re telling me.”

He glared at his coffee cup, and bit the words out. The humiliation of having to say this to someone less than half his age, _about_ someone less than half his age, was complete. And they were in a public place; he couldn’t even use the real words.

“If the world isn’t to go off bang, you will have to fix it with Xander, because I can’t.”

Another long silence.

“Why not?”

Many cultures believed it possible for someone to die of shame; Giles would cheerfully sign up for any one of them if it meant that this could be over and he could have a decent funeral.

“He doesn’t want me to, and I can’t persuade him.” Well, score one for the Watcher. He had managed to make Oz look surprised. “I think the wolf’s wrong.”

Oz shook his head. “Don’t think so.”

He dipped his own head. “All right, maybe you’re right about his inclinations. Maybe you’re even right about... about him being interested in me. But... I can’t get him there. Oz, I’ve tried! I’ve not rushed him, I’ve been gentle, I’ve not said or done anything to frighten him. And he’s trying, I can tell he is. If it weren’t for the, the, necessity, I think we could, could... I can get him so far and then, I think, I think, well, I know because I asked him and he admitted it.”

“Yeah? Admitted what?”

“I get him half way there and then he thinks about what, what’s riding on it. About the, the, about what has to happen and why. And then he panics. Thinks too much and God alone knows, I never thought I would use those words about Xander, but he does. He thinks too much. I can’t get him past it, Oz. Because it, it’s his first time, he hesitates and if it were _just_ that it was the first time, I could, I could... the first time just _is_ difficult. I mean, I know everybody always says that the first time should be special. And people talk as if it’s always good, as if, as if it’s all hearts and flowers and sparkly happiness. And Oz, it’s not. If you’re lucky, it’s not a complete disaster, because you don’t know each other’s bodies, you don’t know what the other person likes, they don’t know what you like. I, I think we make far too much of it being anybody’s ‘first time’.”

“Wouldn’t argue with that.”

“I mean, starting with a joint... Probably a much better idea.”

Their eyes met and Oz grinned. “Yeah. No pressure.”

“Well, quite. My, my first time with a girl,” he had relaxed a little but he would never have imagined himself sharing this sort of information with someone of Oz’s age, except that Oz was... was Oz. Oz could be one of his own contemporaries, rather than Xander's. “My first time was rather shorter on my part, and rather less satisfying on hers, than either of us wished. She couldn’t relax enough to, to, and I, I was...”

“Yeah. Know how that one goes.”

“I mean, we tried again later and it was...”

“Better, yeah.”

“Well, I think it’s almost like that. Xander does like it, as far as, as, and then as soon as I begin to push a little, he thinks about what he’s doing, and why he’s doing it, and he freezes. And if it didn’t matter, I mean about the, the... I would just push a little more, and, and, I don’t mean to do anything, I don’t mean to force, or to do anything he wanted me not to, but just to carry him past his nerves, and if the first time wasn’t so fabulous, I, I don’t doubt my ability to persuade him to try again, and to make it better for him when it wasn’t so strange. But at the moment, I, I, it would be force and I, I can’t. I mean I literally can’t.”

Oz was smiling into his coffee cup. “Said you couldn’t do it by force, didn’t I?”

Giles glared. “Yes, well, thank you, you told me so, but _it doesn’t help_ , Oz. There’s, there’s an apocalypse coming and...”

“And Xander isn’t.”

Giles blinked. That was more a Xander remark than an Oz one, but it got to the point.

“So, so do you think you could... because I’m out of ideas. I swear I’ve, I’ve been patient, I’ve been gentle. But he knows I’m worried and he’s trying too hard. With you he, he might, I don’t mean to be rude but he might expect less.”

Oz pursed his lips, thinking, and got up. “Need sugar.” He went to the café counter, returning with more coffee for both of them, and two doughnuts, one of which he pushed at Giles.

“The wolf isn’t wrong. Sure of that. I still think you and Xander are the best choice for apocalypse aversion.”

“Yes, but...!”

“No, Giles, wait. I’m just thinking. O.K., I’ve known you were looking at him. Trying not to, I got that too, but you were looking at him, and it just happened when it happened. But Xander looking at you... that started when we were still at school.”

“Good lord.”

Oz shrugged. “Didn’t think much of it. Most of us had a crush on some teacher at some point.” He smiled reminiscently. “I was _so_ in love with Miss Minton when I was twelve.”

“Mrs Davies,” agreed Giles. “Seventeen. She was only about twenty-two herself, and God, she was gorgeous. She was a natural disaster in a boys’ boarding school; I can’t imagine why the governors thought employing her was a good idea.”

“Well, didn’t think much of Xander crushing on you. I mean, I was surprised he was looking at a guy, because he was dating girls, but... with the guy thing as given, you were perfectly likely.”

“Because he saw a lot of me,” nodded Giles. “Oz, where is this going?”

Oz did the eyebrow flicker again. “And because you’re hot.”

“I, I, I beg your pardon?”

Second score of the day: he had made Oz laugh. “Giles, the girls tell me often enough that you’re easy on the eye; you’re smart, you’re strong, you’re brave. Translates to hot.”

“I, I, I...”

“Yeah. Xander used to look when we’d been out fighting. Never said but he used to get quite the rush. Adrenaline, and... Faith used to say...”

Giles shrugged quellingly. “I know what Faith used to say.”

Oz smirked at him. “Takes you the same way, doesn’t it?”

“That bloody wolf nose is going to get you into trouble.” He was mortified again.

“And Xander as well, but not quite the same way.” He was thoughtful. “Xander looked at you. Xander racked up the attention when you were... yeah, when you were fighting, or when you were laying down the law to one of us. Xander wasn’t feeling it because _he_ had been fighting. Xander was feeling it because _you_ had.”

Giles snorted into his coffee. “So I should go and slay a vampire and Xander will fall into my arms, fainting maiden style? I _don’t_ think so.”

Oz frowned slightly. “No, didn’t mean that. I just think... You said you’d gone slowly?”

Giles started to tear the doughnut into pieces, carefully. “I went slowly. I was gentle. I don’t think I was threatening. I allowed him to lead, I didn’t try to initiate anything he didn’t seem... I’m not, I’m not complaining about it per se, Oz. If, if Xander and I were, were starting a relationship, I’d do that, and more. I mean, I, I’m twice his age: I could wait until he was, was sure. Was comfortable. Good lord, if he _never_ wanted... there are other things. Some, some people never want to... it doesn’t mean that they can’t have a, a mutually satisfying...”

Oz put a hand on top of his. “The doughnut’s dead already, Giles. Don’t need to slay it. Eat it?” He sat back, obviously thinking, one black-painted fingernail dipping into crushed sugar from his own plate, arranging and rearranging it into little piles. “O.K. So sounds like you _have_ been treating Xander like a fainting Victorian bride.”

He swallowed hard around a piece of sugared dough; it tasted of despair. “I don’t want him hurt, or scared. But we _have_ to... we don’t have long. And I’m beginning to think that I’m the wrong man for the job.”

“Agree with that.”

It was a shockingly painful – and embarrassingly illogical – combination of relief and affront. He stamped on his emotions. They weren’t relevant.

“So, will, will you...”

Oz shook his head. “Don’t think that’s the answer.”

“Well, _what_ then?” He nearly howled it, and a woman at the next table looked up in surprise; he lowered his voice again. “Oz, this is, is...”

“Apocalyptic, yeah. Get that. And I get that Rupert Giles, the quiet librarian, isn’t the man for the job. Neither am I.”

“Well, who is?”

“I think it’s Ripper.”

“ _Ripper_?”

The woman at the next table glared at him; he smiled feebly at her and she looked away. He looked back at Oz.

“Ripper? Oz, Ripper would... Ripper would scare Xander to death. And... I know I talk about Ripper as if he’s somebody else, but I’m not that... that dissociative. If I couldn’t force, Ripper couldn’t either.”

“Ripper put out some, yeah? Back in the day?”

He opened his mouth to deny it, and remembered that Oz had been present when he had admitted to failings in his sexual health. His shoulders slumped and he fiddled with the handle of his coffee cup. “Yes.”

“So O.K., what did Ripper do with a nervous virgin?”

“Dumped her and went looking for somebody who would be less like hard work, usually. And no, I’m not proud of that.”

“And with the girl who was willing but inexperienced?”

He wrinkled his nose. “Pushed a bit. Worked at her. Got her so she... I never went on with a girl who said no. Never. I’d press a bit at the maybes but a genuine no was a no. Get her enjoying herself at something else, dancing, maybe, or, or... and just carry on so that she didn’t think about what she was doing until she’d done it.”

“And that worked?”

“My reputation was, was that I could get into the knickers of some of the girls that the other blokes had failed with.”

“O.K., and with the boys?”

He shrugged. “Same. I wasn’t trying to turn somebody who wasn’t into men, and I wasn’t keen on the man who wasn’t out, but I’d... I’d sort of bounce them, assuming they were keen until they said they weren’t.”

“Why can’t you do that with Xander?”

He gaped. “Because... because Xander's... this is...”

“This is a damn _apocalypse_ , Giles!” Oz was better than Giles at remembering to keep his voice down.

“Yes, but it’s not going to work if Xander's scared of me! It matters, Oz! The, the, when I was young, if I didn’t get laid, the world didn’t end! Not either literally _or_ metaphorically!”

Oz gave him the ‘how disappointing: I thought you were smarter than that’ look again. “Xander isn’t scared of you. I don’t think Xander has _ever_ been scared of you.” He considered again. “Well, maybe except for the time he threw kitchenware at you. Giles, look at the girls Xander chases.”

“What about them?” He was overcome, suddenly, with weariness.

Oz ticked them off on his fingers. “Buffy: Slayer. Willow: witch. Cordelia: um, scary rich-girl type. Anya: demon. I missed the gig, but that teacher? Demon. From all I hear, the mummy-girl? Demon. Are we seeing a trend here?”

“The boy’s a demon magnet. How does that help?”

Oz was too polite to roll his eyes, but Giles could tell he wanted to. “He’s hot for assertive types.” He sat back. One of the advantages of discussing something with Oz was that he would actually think about what other people said – as opposed to the others who would usually just go on repeating their own point of view without absorbing any other information – and that he would allow Giles to do the same. Now, he was picking up his coffee cup, and allowing Giles to think.

He did think; he found that he had finished his coffee, and eaten half the wreckage of the doughnut, by the time he had processed what Oz was saying. He had started from Oz’s contention; he had reviewed what he knew. He had rerun in his head several of Xander's interactions with himself and with other people. He had remembered...

He had remembered Xander and Willow teasing him about something, and that he had eventually glared at both of them and announced firmly, “Watch it: neither one of you is too old _or_ too big to be turned over my knee.” He remembered that Willow had giggled, and that Xander had not, and he had been mildly irritated – although he had said nothing more – that Xander was quick enough to hand it out but not so keen to take it. Now, he recreated the scene in his head, and watched Xander flush, and bite his lip (a Watcher’s powers of observation and recall were useful), and he wondered how he had failed to convert that observation into knowledge of what Xander was really thinking. He thought, and when he eventually lifted his eyes to meet Oz’s, he had a Plan.


	4. Yup, Still Giles

It was important to keep Xander wrong-footed, so he didn’t call ahead; they had agreed the day before that Xander would come to the flat at a certain time, and it was easy enough to work back from that to the time Xander would be leaving home. Then it was just a matter of sliding the car to the kerb and opening the door.

“Xander? Get in.”

He saw Xander's surprise, firstly at Giles in the car, and then at the white tee and the jeans and boots.

“O.K., did I miss a memo? I thought I was coming to yours and we were gonna... ah...”

“Shag like bunnies? We are. Later. Maybe tomorrow. Get _in_.”

“Oh, I see, you’ve been out somewhere?”

“No, we’re going out now.”

“We are?”

He didn’t dignify that with an answer, just jerked his head impatiently. Xander slid into the car, and twisted to look at him. He changed gear smoothly and pulled away.

“Where _are_ we going?”

“Wait and see.” That wouldn’t normally be enough for Xander – why should it? – but Giles took his hand off the wheel and set it on Xander's knee, dragging it firmly upward, to leave with a squeeze and pat at his thigh. Xander jumped convulsively and made an odd sound; Giles laughed.

“Giles!”

“Yes?”

“What was that?”

“That was me feeling you up. Get used to it: I’m intending to do it quite a lot.”

“Have you been drinking? If you’ve been drinking, I want out of this car.”

He grinned. “I have not been drinking.” He drifted his hand up Xander's thigh again; Xander grabbed his wrist before he could get quite high enough, and he squeezed again. “You don’t need to clutch, I won’t let go if you don’t want me to. I didn’t think you’d like it so much.”

“Giles!”

“Yes?”

“If you haven’t been drinking, have you been, I dunno, smoking the funny cigarettes? Taking something you shouldn’t?”

“I have not.” He squeezed again and Xander snatched his own hand back.

“A spell?”

He patted lightly. “I am clean, sober and in my right mind.” From the corner of his eye he caught Xander's look of flat disbelief, and cheerfully qualified the statement. “One of my right minds.”  

“With your hand on my knee?”

“I’m going to have my hands in better places than that before I’ve finished with you.”

He heard a sharp intake of breath and grinned again. He really did hope that Oz was right, because apart from them being in more trouble than he liked to think about if he was wrong, he had forgotten how much fun this could be. And if Oz was right, he could probably do it all again another time. And if Oz was wrong... if Oz was wrong then they were all going to hell in a handbasket, in which case they might as well have some fun _now_.

Ripper knew about having fun.

“Giles? Going a little fast?”

“Pray we don’t meet a copper, then.” He rarely allowed himself to drive _really_ fast nowadays, but he knew how. It was one of the ways his father had tried to reconcile him to the whole Watcher thing: he had been allowed to drive the family Jag, and after the second time that he had spun it on the M23 – he had been expecting to have the keys taken from him – his father had bought him several lessons on a race track from a retired racing driver who had shown him photographs of what happened when you got a corner wrong at speed, and then taught him how to get it right.

It required both hands on the wheel, but it didn’t seem that Xander knew that: every time Giles shifted his grip or changed gear, Xander twitched.

“ _Really_ , Giles, going a little _fast_ ,” as Giles took the racing line through an S-bend, dropped two gears in one change and accelerated away just as one wheel thought about touching the verge.

“ _Giles_!”

“Yes, I know. I like it.” He came up behind something slow – well, somebody observing the speed limit – and allowed the car to loiter behind it. “All right, all right, you don’t like to go fast.” He allowed his voice to darken enough for Xander to hear the implication. “I suppose if we go more slowly, I’ve got a hand free.” He demonstrated it with a tap on Xander's knee, making him jump again.

“ _Giles!_ ”

“Xander,” he purred back.

“Are you... what are you...”

He was merciful. “We’re going to the fair. We’re going to eat junk food, and ride on everything. In an ideal world, we would have conned somebody else into driving, and be working on getting drunk as well.”

“ _Giles!_ ”

“Are you going to say anything else this evening? I mean, I like to hear my name on your lips – and I intend to make sure that you say it lots more, because I think you could beg beautifully – but so far I’m not getting much from you by of snappy conversation.”  He swung the car through the gate into the field which had been given over to parking, ignoring Xander's half-finished and indignant sentences, and threw the door open. “Come on.” He strode across the grass, not, for once, accommodating his stride to Xander's shorter one. By the time Xander caught up, Giles had already purchased two wristbands, one of which he held out with a teasing grin. “Yours. What will you give me for it?”

Xander looked sideways at him, obviously confused, but willing to go along. “What do you want?”

Giles tipped his head to one side as if considering.

“Kiss me. As if you mean it.”

Too much, too soon: Xander flinched. “Here? But...” He looked around. There was a steady stream of people coming past them.

“Little innocence. Love the modesty,” Giles murmured in his ear, backing him into the shadow of the pay booth and round a convenient corner. “Here.” It was a growl. “Nobody can see you.” Xander looked left and right like a nervy horse and Giles steadied him with both hands cupped on his jaw. “One kiss, Xander. But as if you mean it.” He deliberately eased his grip again. He needed to get Xander willingly on board for the ride, feeling it all as just a little bit dangerous and thrilling, before Giles floored the accelerator.

“Just one,” said Xander suddenly, and Giles closed in before he could change his mind. He didn’t make Xander instigate the kiss, but he did back away and murmur reprovingly, “That’s not meaning it,” before coming back a little harder, pushing for Xander to open his mouth, and nipping his lower lip.

“That was two,” said Xander, pulling away breathlessly.

“You didn’t pay up until the second,” scolded Giles softly, catching Xander's wrist and sliding the band over his fingers. “O.K., what sort of ride do you like best? Dodgems or waltzers? Rollercoaster or log ride? Me?”

“What’s dodgems?” enquired Xander, ignoring that last.

Giles pointed.

“Oh, bumper cars. I like the rides that spin, actually. Oh, and I know it’s childish, but I like the pirate ship. Is there a pirate ship?”

Giles looked round. “That? It’s a dragon, from the look of it, not pirates, but I know what you mean. I like that too. I think we might skip the Haunted House, or Mystery Mansion or whatever it is... Am I going to be able to persuade you into the Tunnel of Love?” That was purred directly into Xander's ear again, making him jump and blush; he didn’t answer.

“Rollercoaster first?” He knew better than to push too hard early on; he wanted Xander just a little unsure, a little off-balance, literally – and emotionally.

“Yeah. And then the Tilt-A-Whirl.” He pointed.

Playing right into Giles’ hands. Anything which spun would throw them against each other; if Giles couldn’t make Xander aware that his body was pressed against another man’s...

“Your Tilt-A-Whirl is my waltzer. And I don’t think I have a name for _that_ thing, but we’re going to ride it.”

“That’s BreakDance. Don’t you know BreakDance?”

Giles pushed him towards the rollercoaster. “I don’t know the individual names: they change. How are you on being swung upside down?”

“Scream like a girl and demand to go again.”

Good enough. Even better if the rides made him laugh.

He spent the next hour touching Xander. Anywhere that people might see, the touches were innocent: his hand in the small of Xander's back, ushering him towards a ride; his fingers on Xander's knee as he leaned over to pull a safety bar across them both; his arm around Xander, drawing back out of the way of a family with small children and allowing them to go ahead in a queue. There was nothing to which Xander might object. Not anywhere that people might see.

Where they couldn’t see, it was a different matter. Under the line of sight of the people in the opposite car, Giles had a hand high on Xander's thigh, tickling the inner seam of his jeans while Xander squirmed and hissed his name indignantly; in a tight snaking queue, Giles was turned towards Xander to talk, body blocking Xander's movement, hand on Xander's arse; closely jammed against his side on the Flying Bob, Xander squeaked to find that Giles had worked a hand underneath him. It was plainly no more than teasing: if Xander gathered himself enough to tell Giles to stop, Giles did. There was never quite enough for Xander to be offended or frightened; it was always enough to keep Xander a little apprehensive about what Giles would do next. He was always trotting behind: Giles headed from one attraction to the next, always a little faster than Xander, so that Xander had to stretch and scurry to keep up, and every time, Giles would turn and give him that Ripperish grin – and get a grin in return. Xander didn’t know what was going on – but he _was_ enjoying the fair, even if the price of his fun was Giles’ thumb hooked over the waistband of his jeans.

“Food?”

With Giles’ longer legs he was ten feet in front by the time he reached the stand; he held out the hot dog just as Xander caught him up, turning back to accept his own.

“Thought you didn’t eat junk food, G-Man?”

“I do on occasion.”

“And this is an occasion?”

Giles eyed Xander up and down, slowly. “Oh, I think so.” He let his glance settle on Xander's mouth, stretching to accommodate the hot dog, and smirked. Xander choked, coughed, and swallowed hard.

“Giles!”

Innocent look. “Yes?”

Xander just shook his head, but Giles laughed aloud when he started tearing small pieces off his hot dog and eating it that way. He swallowed the last of his own, and waited for Xander to finish and toss the paper napkin in a bin.

“Am I shocking you, Xander?” That was low and decidedly Ripperish.

“I... no, it’s just... I mean...”

He had been looking around for a suitable location, and had spotted one, between two trailers which were parked close together. He grabbed Xander's wrist, and towed him over in that direction, sliding into the shadows and intruding on the personal space of the couple already there.

“Move up a bit, mate, will you? Give us some room here?” He saw Xander's mouth open wide in horrified amusement, and pulled him in close.

“Giles!”

He pushed Xander against the wall behind him, hands on his waist, and his mouth against Xander's ear. “Don’t tell me you’ve never found a quiet place to neck. You and Cordelia fell out of enough cupboards at my feet.” He licked the side of Xander's neck and nuzzled into his shoulder. “If I try to kiss you, are you going to scream? You’re not, are you?” he coaxed. “Come on, you keep telling me you’re so shocked, but...” and he kissed Xander quickly, hardly more than a touch, “I’m not hearing you complain.” He returned for a slower kiss; Xander still jumped every time he let a hand wander, but he wasn’t trying to escape, or turning his face away; Giles turned until it was his own back against the wall, and gave his full attention to kissing Xander. There was an oath from the other man, and a scuffle as he and his partner left.

“Oh God, were they...” Xander pulled back in sudden realisation. “Did they _see_ you kissing me?”

Giles nodded, feeling the amused excitement fizz through his veins. He’d always had a degree of exhibitionism: it hadn’t been pure chance that Buffy had caught him kissing Miss Calendar in the library, and however guilty he felt about the band candy affair, however much he regretted not catching Ethan and kicking three sorts of shit out of him, however much he knew that he had treated Joyce badly, the knowledge that he’d had her on the bonnet of a car, in full view of _anybody_ who might have happened to pass – and he’d had several slightly odd looks from total strangers in the days that had followed – that knowledge still occasionally kept him company in an otherwise lonely bed and helped to make it a little less lonely. And a little stickier, but what the hell.

“Oh God, what did they think we were doing? I mean, not that there can be much doubt about it, because hello, two men, darkened corner, and you’re all with the hands and the... what has gotten _into_ you?”

Giles shrugged. “Nothing. Yet. Unless you might like to later?”

“Giles!”

He bit Xander's neck, hard, and sucked. That would leave a mark, and from Xander's squeak and squirm, he knew it. “Yup. Still Giles. I don’t know why you keep needing to confirm it. And as to what they thought we were doing, I think they thought we were doing the same as they were doing.”

Xander's expression was uncomfortable. “I... I heard what he said. What he called us. He thought we were... disgusting.”

Ripper escaped for a moment. “She didn’t.”

“Huh?”

“She was watching us, over his shoulder. She liked it. I bet if we went looking for them, we could get her away from him.” He’d done that too, back in the day. He and Ethan, kissing in the park, following the man who had dared to comment, trailing him into a pub, making eyes at his girlfriend, coaxing her away. Seducing her. Melanie, her name had been, and two men at once had been a new experience for her. A new experience for Giles too, although he hadn’t told her so. A new experience for Ethan, he suspected, but Ethan had always sworn not.

“She was _watching_?”

“Mm-hm. She liked it.”

“ _Watching us_?” It was pitched so high that a passing bat would have shown interest. Giles let his hands slide down to cup Xander's arse; if being watched was a distraction, he would make good use of it.

“Xander, are you telling me you’ve never watched lesbian porn?”

He actually felt the rush of blood to Xander's face in the form of heat against his own cheek. “I... I, that’s not, it isn’t, I mean...”

“Today’s headline, Xander: I don’t think women are as hung up on visual cues as men are, but some straight women will watch gay porn too.” He wasn’t entirely unsympathetic: he could remember being surprised by that himself. “And yes, she was watching, and she was definitely interested.” He let his voice drop. “She’ll think about it later. She’ll think about the way you looked when I kissed you. She’ll think about what I might have done next – about my hands on you. My mouth on you. She’ll wonder what we did, whether I got a hand inside your jeans,” he drifted his fingertips up Xander's fly, “and made you grind against me. Or she’ll wonder if I went on my knees and blew you, right here, where anybody might walk by.” Xander was all but hyperventilating, but there were definite stirrings of interest under Giles’ hand. He pressed hard. “She’ll wonder if I took you home and bent you over the back of the couch and had you there, jeans round your knees. Or if we only just made it back to the car, jerked each other off in the back seat. She’ll picture it, I bet you.” Xander's hips were pushing against his palm; Xander was picturing it too.

He took his hand away and Xander made a sound half way between relief and indignation. “Later,” soothed Giles in amusement; there was enough light for him to see the glare Xander gave him.

“I know what you’re doing, you know.”

He cocked an eyebrow.

“You’re trying to get me all worked up so that later I’ll... I won’t...”

“So that later,” he whispered into the curve of an ear, before licking it swiftly, “you’ll let me show you _just_ how good it can be. Tell me, did any of those girls you hung around with ever blow you?”

Xander looked away.

“Not willing to kiss and tell? I’m not asking for names. _Did_ any of them?”

A single nod.

“Did you like it?”

“Well, duh.”

“And did she take you all the way?”

The hesitation was enough for him. “Did she say that nice girls don’t do that?”

The faint smile was enough to tell him that whichever of them it was had said something along those lines.

“I’ve been called lots of things, Xander, but not even my worst enemy would say I was a ‘nice girl’. I swallow.”

And before Xander could assimilate that, Giles was away, heading towards the bright lights of another fairground attraction. By the time Xander caught up – Giles was prepared to bet that he had needed a moment to adjust himself, and he still seemed a little stiff in the knees – he had managed to attach words to his objections.

“Giles!”

“Still Giles here.”

“It’s not... it’s not fair!”

Giles winced. He couldn’t argue with that. Whatever it was, it _wasn’t_ fair.

“I _know_ what I have to do, and I’ve been trying! Come on, Giles, you know I’ve been trying.”

“You’ve been very trying.” He couldn’t resist it, and was sorry when Xander winced again.

“Look, I... I haven’t... I never said...”

Giles turned to face him. “You never said no,” he agreed quietly. “Not out loud.”

“But it’s not fair to talk about...” Xander suddenly realised that they were standing in the middle of a sizeable crowd. “To talk about that sort of thing, when you know that I can’t... we can’t.”

“Why can’t we?”

“Because we have to... do the other thing.”

Giles shrugged. “They aren’t mutually exclusive. It’s not either-or.”

“I... huh?”

“We know what I have to do.”

“Yeah.”

“And we know what you have to do.”

“I have to let you. And I have to...” He tipped his head sideways.

“Quite. And how do you think I intend to ensure that you do?”

Xander frowned, still with his head tipped sideways; Giles had a sudden flashback to his mother’s cocker spaniel, which used to look at him in the same apparent bewilderment, if not for the same reason.

“Can you... will that work?”

Giles snorted. “Believe me, I can make it work.”

“But don’t we have to... um... together?”

“I was intending to arrange for that not to be a problem. Absolutely concurrently isn’t required: just that we both do. And trust me, you will.” He watched Xander absorb this, and leaned close to add, “More than once, if I get my way.”

Xander was hyperventilating again. “You want... you want to...?”

“I want _you_ to.” He decided abruptly that there had been quite enough serious conversation, and began to walk again; Xander followed. “I want to see how many times I can make you before you tell me you want me not to do it again.”

“I, I... huh?”

He turned back and spelled it out. “Once, we have to. Once to save the world. Beyond that? If you tell me you don’t want to do it again,” he was backing Xander towards a trailer again, looking for whatever privacy could be obtained by a big man with his back turned to the world and his voice low, “if you tell me you don’t want me to touch you, or suck you off, if you tell me _you_ don’t want to fuck _me_ ,” and Xander's mouth fell open to match his shocked eyes, “if you tell me you don’t like it, I’ll let you alone.” Xander's back hit the trailer; Giles leaned in. “But you won’t tell me that, because you _will_ like it. You can count on it.” And he turned away again before Xander could answer. “Come on, I can see a shooting gallery.”

He wasn’t sure whether Xander was genuinely distracted, or just thrown too badly to make any more of the conversation. Certainly, he trotted along towards the shooting gallery without arguing.

“Looks like stationary targets just for the hell of it, and moving ones for prizes. Rifle or hand gun?”

Xander shrugged. “I’ll pass.”

He must have shown his surprise, because Xander shrugged again. “I can’t hit the side of a barn with either. There was a funfair once when I was a kid... Dead waste of five bucks, Dad said.”

Giles frowned. “It’s no harder than...” Than a crossbow, he was going to say, and Xander was competent with a crossbow, if not good, but that was another conversation which would be better not overheard. “Did anybody ever actually _teach_ you to handle a gun? Or are you saying you can’t do it because you failed once when you were too small to reach over the counter?”

The lack of an answer was answer enough. “Right. Let me... Hand gun and stationary target. That’ll be easier: I won’t have to translate everything from left-handed to right.” He held out his hand to the stall-owner, accepting the scruffy pellet gun and eyeing up the target. “Easy enough: watch, Xander.”

His first shot was on the target, but a little high and to the left; his second was closer and the last four were closely grouped on the centre. “Your turn. You must have watched enough police thrillers; both hands, stand square. Good. Now,” and he plastered himself to Xander's back, his chin on Xander's shoulder, his lightly-balled hands under Xander's wrists. “Relax.” The stall-owner was grinning; they ignored him. Giles lowered his voice and spoke directly into Xander's ear. “Give a little at the knees. Don’t bend them; just soften enough to keep your balance. Relax at the hips. Lean a little back into me and I’ll keep you steady. Don’t let your elbows stiffen: just keep everything soft.” And if Xander could, with something as pointedly phallic as a gun in his hands, and his hips tucked back into Giles’ groin, Giles would be very surprised. “Calmly. Calmly. You’re not going to pull the trigger; you’re just going to squeeze. Slowly. It’s delicate: think of it,” and he smiled wickedly and knew that Xander heard it in his voice, “think of it as something you don’t want to hurt. Squeeze.”

The little pellet gun snapped. “High,” said the stall-owner, with professional interest.

“Good for a first try. Again now. Relax your shoulders. Sight on the target, not the barrel, and then move your hands. Think that the gun keeps still, it’s just an extension of your wrist and hand. Don’t move the gun, move your hands. Bring your hands to the target... Softly... and squeeze. Good! Better. Again. Never mind me, I’m just keeping your body steady. You’re firing, not me. Don’t lift your shoulders, don’t hunch. Stay relaxed.” He was far from relaxed himself: Xander warm against his body was interesting in the extreme. “Squeeze. Good! Very nice! Again. Look, you tend to pull high and right where I pull high and left. Recognise that and allow for it. Good, right direction but too far. Again and not so much. Better! Last one. Steady yourself. Don’t rush. We have all the time we need...”

“Very nice,” approved the stall-owner; Giles nodded at him.

“We’ll try the moving target.”

It was stylised ducks, rising and falling on curling metal waves. “Shoulders, Xander. Keep your shoulders still against me. I’ll support your wrist; you aim. Moving targets are harder but these are regular so find the point that it passes and wait for it. Wait... wait... and... No, too quick. Try again. Wait. Better. Again. Wait for it. Let it come to you... Good! O.K., now we’ll try picking the target rather than waiting for it to find us. Move with me, keep your wrists up. I’ll aim it, you choose when to fire.”

He hit the moving target twice more, frowning with concentration; Giles stepped back. “Remind me next week; I’ll take you to the place I practise and sign you in as a guest, teach you properly. You ought to know how.” Neither of them mentioned why. “But that’s not at all bad, three out of six with a funfair pop-gun.”

“Three out of six wins a prize,” said the stall-owner, winking at Giles, “but you’ll have to share it,” and he held something out to Xander, who blushed, and took it with a muttered word of thanks and without looking. Giles hung an arm over his shoulder and turned him away.

They had managed about a hundred yards before Xander had mastered himself enough to look at what he was holding. Then he stopped dead with a squawk of commingled horror and amusement.

“Giles!”

“Still Giles,” confirmed Giles. “What?”

“It’s... it’s a...”

“What?”

“We’ve won a cuddly vampire.”

“A...?”

Xander held it out. He was quite correct: their prize was a badly made soft toy in the form of a rather overweight vampire, dressed in black, white-faced and with scarlet fangs. Giles stared at it, speechless, for a moment, and then choked out, “Look at the angsty expression! It’s Angel!”

For a moment they hung on each other, laughing, before Xander shook his head and said, “I was gonna just dump it in a trashcan, or palm it off on some kid but... Giles, we really gotta keep him, don’t you think? He can live at your place and when you’re having a bad day, you can give him some grief. Kick him down the stairs or stick pins in him.”

“Take him outdoors in daylight.”

“Use him for crossbow practice.”

“He lives with me. It’s a deal. Oh God, he’s worth the admission price all on his own, even without the rollercoaster.” He wrapped his arm around Xander's shoulders, and for just a fraction of a second, Xander leaned, not away from him, but in, before he recollected himself and drew away again.

It was time.

“Time to go home.” It wiped the smile off Xander's face, but he licked his lips, and nodded, without argument. It wouldn’t take much more, but Giles had to keep him _just_ on edge.

“Here.” He beckoned Xander after him and led him back to the pay booth, which was still doing business, sliding round the side to the quiet spot he had found previously. “Put your back against that wall. Give Little Angel to me. Have you got a stake?” Stupid question; they all did, always, and Xander nodded again. “Put your hands at your sides, flat against the wall. Now, you’re going to stay there, just like that, until I come back. You’re not to move your hands unless you need to go for the stake, understand?”

He didn’t. “What for?”

Giles smiled darkly. “Because I’m telling you to. I’m going to get something; you’re going to stand there, just like that, and wait for me.”

“But...” Xander stepped forward; Giles shook his head, took Xander by the shoulders, and turned him, patting his backside warningly.

“Is _that_ what you want, Xander? No? Then do as I tell you. Back against the wall, palms flat beside you, and wait.” He took a swift kiss again. “I’ll know if you move, and I’ll make you smart for it.” He stepped back; Xander's expression was a priceless combination of embarrassment and arousal, seasoned with incomprehension. “I might just decide to make you smart anyway.” He heard Xander drag in a breath; that was perilously close to a whimper. “Stay there; don’t move. I won’t be long.” He had seen what he wanted not a hundred yards away; he strode towards it, refusing to turn his head to see if Xander had obeyed him. He’d played these games before: act as if disobedience is unthinkable, and it will be.  

Certainly if Xander had moved while his back was turned, he had settled himself again by the time Giles came back. He had shifted his feet a little away from the wall so that it looked as if he was merely loafing, leaning on any available support, rather than pinned in position by the force of Giles’ will. Strictly speaking, that counted as movement, but that was for a more extreme game, of which Xander didn’t know the rules. Yet, Giles thought in dark amusement; he didn’t know the rules _yet_ ,before catching himself and recollecting that after this once, there might not be a second opportunity.

“Come.” It was a snapped order – and another one which might belong to a darker game. Xander jumped; and Giles heard his breath snatch again. Perhaps... Well. Perhaps Xander _would_ like those games?

And perhaps not with Giles. He must _not_ allow himself to dwell on them. He was doing just enough to avert the apocalypse; anything more afterwards depended on there being an afterwards for more to go in, and on Oz having been right about Xander's interest, and on Xander being brave enough and willing enough to act on it.

He unlocked the car, and held the door politely for Xander, before retreating to his own side of the car. Unbalance him again, Giles; leave him not knowing if he was being courted or commanded.

“Where did you go? I could see you bought something but not what it was.”

“Candy floss.” He flipped the packet into Xander's lap.

“Cotton candy? I wouldn’t have put you down as a pure sugar man.”

“I have plans for it.” He glanced swiftly around, but he didn’t think they were overlooked. “Open it. Now, get a big twist.”

Xander, faintly surprised again, did as he was told, winding the fluff into a knot. Just as he was about to lift it to his mouth, Giles caught his wrist, and pulled, closing his own lips on Xander's fingers.

He felt the jerk run right through them both; he sucked hard and got another of those delightful gasps. Then he ran his tongue delicately over Xander's skin, and felt his fingers quiver.

“I thought I might coat you in sugar and lick it off, carefully.” There was silence, except for Xander's harsh breathing. Then the plastic rustled as Xander turned his fingers in the sugar again, and held them out wordlessly. Giles went more slowly this time, exploring each finger down to the webbing, tracing his tongue around each knuckle in turn.

That was definitely a whimper. He wondered if he dared risk more; watched Xander's face as he reached in turn for the spun sugar and saw some apprehension, but no genuine fear or dismay; offered his fingers to Xander's mouth, and shut his eyes and shuddered when Xander, clumsy at first but growing in confidence, ran the flat of his tongue over Giles’ fingertips. Oh God. He took the packet back, twisted the neck of it and threw it into the back seat.

“Sit on your hands,” he ordered, abruptly, only half expecting to be obeyed. “Now, knees wide. Good. We’re going home.”


	5. Let The Dog See The Rabbit

The drive was the difficult bit. Difficult because he had to keep Xander in the same frame of mind, without letting him have long enough to think about what he was doing. Difficult because Giles himself was hard, because he wanted to pull the car into any darkened corner, and plaster himself over Xander's body. Difficult because he needed to be _alert_ , dammit, he needed to be clever and imaginative and _in control_.

Fortunately the roads permitted him a hand free more often than not; he could get his fingers to the inside of Xander’s thigh, to caress and once or twice to pinch. He was a little surprised, but definitely gratified, to see that although Xander squirmed, and once or twice pinned his knees together until corrected with a light slap, he kept his hands underneath his thighs.

When the car drew up, he allowed himself one kiss, one quick exploration of Xander's mouth, before he opened his door – and Xander sat still, looking straight in front of him, hands beneath his thighs, not attempting to open the car, or move. That was _beyond_ gratifying. Giles walked calmly around the bonnet, and opened the door.

“Very good.” He deliberately made his voice warm, and Xander did turn his head then, looking up with an expression of mixed apprehension and hope. Giles reached past him for the candy floss, and smiled. “Come inside.” Xander was quite capable of hearing the ambiguity in that.

Inside, Xander stopped again; Giles closed the door and pushed him against it in one smooth movement, following to kiss him hard: mouth, throat, ears, while one hand worked busily at shirt buttons, and then collar bones, teased with rough bites, breastbone licked wetly.

Nipples.

It seemed that Xander liked having his nipples licked and sucked and bitten; he made delightful throaty sounds which more than made up for the ache in Giles’ back and knees arising from the ungainly crouch needed to get his head low enough. He straightened, with some relief, continuing to play with the wet nub under his right hand, scratching and twisting gently. His left hand quested lower, and Xander gasped.

Giles grinned and took both hands away; the sound Xander made was definitely indignant, but it rose to a decided squawk when Giles slid to his knees – he was going to feel this at least as much as Xander would tomorrow, if not in the same places – and tore open Xander's fly.

He didn’t ask for permission: they were past that. He simply wrapped one hand around Xander's shaft, and slid his mouth over the waiting tip.

He actually had to throw his weight against Xander's legs to keep him upright. Xander's head thumped back against the door; his hands flailed wildly for a moment before coming to rest on Giles’ shoulders, fingers clawed into his shirt. Apparently he liked that: there was a keening “ohyesohyesohfuckyes” which was about as encouraging as Giles could have hoped for.

He mustn’t overdo it. He backed away, removing his head with one long slow powerful suck and a quick flicker of his tongue on the sensitive ridge (eliciting a strangled sound he wanted to hear again). Then he looked up.

“There’s as much more of that as you want, whenever you want it. You just have to ask.”

Xander wasn’t, apparently, capable of asking. Xander didn’t appear to be capable of speech. Xander was panting and debauched: clothing all anyhow, mouth swollen where he had bitten his lip, erection bumping wetly against his stomach. Giles rocked back and got to his feet.

“Upstairs.”

Xander gripped his waistband to stop his trousers falling off completely and looked blankly around as if he didn’t quite remember where the stairs were. Giles kissed him again, and then turned him manually, landing a smart slap on his arse.

“Go.”

For half a second he wondered if the slap had been a mistake: he was certain now that Xander liked to be ordered, liked to feel that somebody else was in control – although that might or might not be a permanent thing: Giles could quite easily believe that it would only be something to get him through an apocalyptically important first time. But liking to be commanded, liking to be made to obey, didn’t always or necessarily go with liking even the very minor (and traditional) sting of a smack on the bottom. A submissive wasn’t necessarily also a masochist, and even among the ones who were, there were those who found spanking disrespectful and unpleasant. Unpleasant, as Xander might have put it himself, not in a good way. But no, it seemed that he needn’t have troubled: Xander jerked forward towards the stairs, but one hand trailed behind him, fingertips light on the punished cheek, and the glance he threw over his shoulder at Giles showed nothing but arousal.

Once upstairs Giles reached for the bedside light; the glare of the overhead bulb would, he thought, be off-putting, but he needed to be able to see, to read Xander's responses. He was very much aware that every hesitation, every hiatus, left Xander beginning to think again, to consider what he was saying and doing, to be aware of his apprehension and anxiety. He couldn’t afford any indecision. He _had_ to appear confident. Masterful.

He reached for Xander and pushed the shirt from his shoulders before tugging him down onto the bed.

“You’re beautiful,” he said hoarsely, and ran a line of kisses down Xander's breastbone. “And you’ll be even more beautiful when you’re squirming on my cock. Let’s get these clothes off you.” He was careful to tug his own shirt off before he started on the rest of Xander's clothes; to have Xander naked while he was still fully dressed would be an enormous turn-on for him, but he wasn’t stupid enough to think that it would necessarily be the same for Xander. And indeed, Xander seemed uneasy at having Giles look at him, although he didn’t object or try to draw away. He permitted Giles to undress him, but he lay looking at his hands while Giles, whose own hands were trembling more than he cared to admit, divested himself of his own clothing.

“Xander?” He kept his tone gentle, but very firm. There was to be no question of Xander not doing as he was bid. “Look at me, please.”

Xander raised his eyes to Giles’ face.

“No, look at all of me. _Look_ at me.” He stood beside the bed, hands by his sides. “I know this is strange, but I’m still Giles. You weren’t afraid of me an hour ago; you don’t need to be now.”

A beat, and then Xander gave a jerky nod, and his eyes swept down and up. Giles, looking past him, could see in the mirror what Xander saw: a middle-aged man, greying, fit for his age, but heavily marked from claw and fang and blade. Not, he told himself, what was deserved by a boy of barely twenty – but if it came to a matter of passing on the essence of the warrior, he would do.

He would have to do.

“Touch me.” His voice allowed no argument, and Xander offered none, sitting up and reaching over to lay a hand on his chest, and then slide it downwards to fall away from his navel. Giles smiled, and set his knee on the bed. Xander moved back, but only to give him room; as soon as he lay down, the hand was replaced on his chest.

“I’m just... a bit wigged, you know?”

He did know. How could he not know? He reached from the bed for the pack of candy floss. “I shall bribe you with refined sugar.”

He did. He decorated Xander's body with pink fluff, and licked it off again, until Xander was laughing and squirming, and then he pushed the packet into Xander's hands and lay back himself, arms wide. “Anywhere you like, but I warn you, I’m ticklish at the back of the knees.”

That, of course, had to be investigated, and then Xander, a little awkwardly, took his turn with the candy floss. Awkwardly, but bravely: having tried three or four other places, he twisted a sticky string around Giles cock, and with only a moment’s hesitation, licked it off again.

“Well done,” managed Giles, hoarsely; his preference was for slightly more definite handling but he wasn’t going to criticise: for a first attempt it had been perfectly acceptable, and too gentle was always better than too rough. Nonetheless, Xander backed away with a distinct air of hoping that no more would be expected of him. Time for Giles to take charge again. He wound his fingers in sugar strands and held them to Xander's mouth.

“Suck.” His voice was filled with command, and Xander obeyed him. “I want every last trace of sugar off my skin.” He actually wanted more than that: he wanted his fingers slick and wet, and when he withdrew them from Xander's mouth, he made no attempt to disguise what he was doing. Xander stiffened at the probing finger, his expression went blank and introspective and his mouth opened slowly. “Relax.”

“Easy for – you to – say.”

“And you’re going to do as you’re told, aren’t you?” He let just a little threat sound in his voice. “I’m going to tell you what to do; you’re going to do it, and that way everything will be all right. And if you don’t do as you’re told... what do you think I’ll do?”

Threats or not, the distraction seemed to have Xander relaxing a little.

“Perhaps I’ll just haul you over my knee and tan your backside. I’ve been tempted more than once, you know, when you’ve been particularly impertinent.”

Xander squirmed, although whether it was at his words or his fingers, he couldn’t tell. He let his voice soften. “But I promised you that I’d make sure you liked this, didn’t I? And I will. You need to help me: relax. I know it feels odd, and I won’t lie to you: it might hurt a little to begin with. It won’t be for long, and it won’t be much. By the time I’ve finished with you, you’ll be begging me for more. You liked it when I sucked your cock, didn’t you? And this is going to be much better.” He withdrew his hand, and leaned conspicuously to the dresser drawer. Xander bit his lip at the sight of lube.

“Don’t worry,” Giles assured him, deliberately misunderstanding his expression. “I’ve got another tube. Two, actually. Enough even for a little innocent like you. I’m going to make you so slick that – well, I won’t say that you won’t feel it at all, because you will. But you’re going to be wondering what you made so much fuss about.” He watched Xander's expression carefully. That was perhaps more of a surprise than it should have been. Xander talked all the time – _all_ the time – so it really ought not to have been a revelation to Giles to learn that Xander was aroused by sex talk. “I’m going to open you up like one of my books. Lay you out.” He was busy with the slick. “I’m going to get my cock so far up your arse that you’ll taste me when you swallow, and you’re going to love it. I’m going to find all the places that make you writhe.” Xander was panting now, and Giles explored a little further. “I’m going to make sure that you can’t ever say...” He wasn’t sure quite what Xander wouldn’t be able to say, but it didn’t matter, because his fingertip brushed the right spot and Xander bucked on his hand and cried out wildly, curling half off the bed and clutching at Giles.

“That’s the way,” he encouraged. “Like that? Let me stretch you just a little more – just one more finger – and then we’ll try the real thing. If you think that was good, wait until you feel what it’s like with my cock doing it. How many times do you think I can make you come? Do you know how good you feel, even like this, just on my fingers? You’re soft, and hot, and slick. God, I want you. I want to fuck you until you can’t think of anything except me. And I’m bloody going to. How shall we do it? Shall I pound into you? Hook your knees over my shoulders and go at you like a trip hammer? Do you fancy that? You do, Xander. Don’t tell me you don’t. You’re hard just listening to me talk about it. Your cock’s drooling at the very thought. Is that what you want?”

Xander whined a little; Giles thought it was a mixture of arousal and total brain-freezing embarrassment.

“Maybe I’m not inclined to give you what you want,” he scolded softly. “Maybe I feel like taking what _I_ want. Maybe I don’t want it over so fast. Maybe I want you to lock your legs around my waist so that I can slide into you so slowly, feel you hot and tight around me. I could just rock a little, just a little, just enough to keep the feeling building and building, until you were desperate to be allowed to come. But I would make you wait, and wait, until you thought you would die if I didn’t allow you, until you were begging me. I could hold your hands away, not allow you a single touch on your cock, or on your body, just keep rocking until all you could think about was my cock in your arse. Don’t know if you would like that, but _I_ would. I’d like to hear you beg.”

“Oh God, Giles...”

“Starting already? Excellent. Turn over, then, and let’s see... Up on your knees.” He tucked himself in against Xander's thighs, hands busy on Xander's waist, chest, shoulders. “Now.” He lined himself up carefully; it was one thing to offer Xander talk of rough sex; rough sex itself wasn’t for the inexperienced, particularly not when it mattered so much that it should be good for them both. Still, if Xander liked the talk, Giles would give it to him. “Let the dog see the rabbit,” he said crudely, and thrust, but shallowly.

Xander cried out softly, but Giles could hear that it was surprise, not discomfort. “Keep still,” he commanded, and pushed a little deeper. He ran his hands over Xander's back and sides, scratching gently, stroking, distracting, and rocking, as he had said, rocking slowly, a little deeper each time. Xander made another faint noise, and this one _was_ discomfort; he slowed his movements, cutting down to almost nothing and leaning forward to kiss the arched spine. “Relax,” he said softly. “Don’t fight me. Let me in.” He slid a hand over Xander's sweat-slicked hip, and reached round. Xander's erection was flagging; he pressed his lips to the sharp shoulder-blade and scrabbled for another distraction.

“Liked it better,” gasped Xander, struggling but game, “when you had your mouth on my dick.”

“If you liked that I can think of other places you’ll like it.” Distraction, distraction, distraction. 

“Huh?”

“I’d like to kiss you all the way from your tailbone,” and he tapped it lightly before dragging a finger slowly downward and meeting it with the other hand coming round in front and upward, “to the tip of your cock. And then back again.”

There was a moment while Xander processed this, and then his body surged, bucking like an overfed pony. “Sweet fuck!”

Giles gained half an inch; “Like that idea?”

“Can you... is that... do people _do_ that?”

“I’m not ‘people’, but yes, I do it.” That gained him another half inch.

“Isn’t it a bit...” Xander was breathless, which might have been interest, or shock, or horror; from the way his cock jumped when Giles palmed it, he didn’t think it was horror.

“A bit...?”

Xander's head was turned to one side; Giles could see half his expression. “Are you _really_ talking about...?”

“I’m talking about rimming you. Licking you all the way from _here_ to _here_.” That surge again.

“But...” Xander was lost for words, and wasn’t _that_ a first.

“Soap,” said Giles primly, “is a wonderful invention. As is mouthwash.” He was still again; he could _feel_ Xander thinking.

“I don’t think... I don’t think I could do that.”

“Don’t, then,” he said, amiably. “It’s not compulsory.” He gave another shallow thrust. “Are you going to let _me_ do it?” Thrust. “Are you going to let me put my tongue in your arse?”

Xander made a most peculiar sound and shoved his hips back. Giles allowed himself to sound amused. “Am I shocking you again?”

“Yes!”

“How dreadful.” He began to ease away. “What’s so shocking? Boring librarian has sex?” And back. “Boring librarian _likes_ sex?” Out. “Boring librarian likes sex with Xander?” In. “There is more to being a librarian than you ever guessed.” He let his hands drift again. “There are books about sex, Xander. _I’ve read them_. So _now_ do you get the point of research? Mind you, research is all very well, but there’s something to be said for field experience too. Or back seat of car experience. Or standing up against a wall behind the bike sheds experience. Or” and he hoped that Buffy hadn’t shared her horror with Xander, “bent over the bonnet of a car experience.” He set up a steady rhythm. “I’ve got all of those. And all of them – with the possible exception of the bike sheds because I think that nowadays it would get me arrested – I would like to try again with you.”

Xander gasped and flexed his back and froze as Giles hit the sweet spot.

“Ah yes, there. What was I saying?” And he went on saying it, a slow trickle of suggestion and encouragement, of descriptions of how Xander looked and sounded and felt, of all the places and ways he would like to have Xander. He reached round and gripped Xander's erection, working it masterfully, until Xander whined with confusion between the touch in front and the thrust behind. Xander's movements became ragged and desperate and Giles held the tempo for both of them, until Xander shuddered, babbled something which wasn’t quite words, and spilled wetly into his hand with a hoarse cry.

Then he shut his eyes and his mouth, leaned his forehead against Xander's shoulder, and allowed himself to come.

For a minute there was nothing to be heard except their harsh breathing; then Giles shifted and Xander whined.

“I know. This bit isn’t particularly comfortable for you, but it will be much worse if we stick together. Give me a moment. I... good lord.”

“What?” Xander's voice was unsteady.

“I, I, just something I didn’t... There was a line in the translation I didn’t understand, about the light of manhood overcoming the sacri... the volunteer. I didn’t realise it was literal.”

“Huh?”

“You’re... glowing.”

“Huh?”

He reached over and flicked off the light; in the darkness, Xander shone.

“Fuck!”

He turned the light on again. Xander had shifted onto his back and was holding up one arm and staring at it. He gave Giles a look of blank terror.

“No, it’s a good sign; it means the spell has completed.”

“Glowing in the dark here, Giles! Gonna have real trouble explaining this at home, and I’ll be vampire fodder!”

“I don’t think so,” he said gently. “It’s fading already.” He was rather sorry: it had been extremely beautiful. Pointless, and as Xander had pointed out, inconvenient, but beautiful.

“The spell...”

“Completed, yes.”

“Oh.” He shut his eyes; after a moment he rolled away from Giles, who reached fruitlessly for something to say.

“Are... are you all right?” Stupid, stupid, of _course_ he wasn’t all right.

“Yeah. Just...” His voice was shaky; Giles longed to gather him into his arms, to murmur comforting words, to pet and reassure. “I just...” that was slightly too loud, and the insecurity could be heard quite clearly. “Sorry, Giles, never done this before – well, you knew that – and I don’t quite know what to say. Or do. Health class covered the, the, who does what to who, but not what you say afterwards.”

Bugger it, he was damn well going to pet a bit. He put his hand on Xander's shoulder, and snatched it away again when Xander flinched. Then he saw that Xander had his eyes screwed shut, as if expecting a blow, and he carefully put his hand back. “I shouldn’t worry. There’s nothing in the Watcher’s Handbook, either. We’ll just have to wing it. We’ve done all right so far, haven’t we?” And oh God, that was surely the wrong thing to say, because Xander must... whatever Oz thought, however successfully they had got through the apocalypse aversion, that couldn’t have been how Xander wanted to lose his virginity, assuming he ever wanted to lose it at all. “You saved the world.”

“Don’t suppose I can put it on my résumé.”

“I’ll be sure to include it when I write your reference,” Giles assured him solemnly, and got a faint huff which might have been laughter. “Xander...”

He was amazed when Xander heaved over to face him and scrabbled in close, pushing his face against Giles’ chest, but his arms closed naturally around the overheated body. “You’re shaking... hell! Did I... did I hurt you? Frighten you? I’m sorry, you know I... You must know I wouldn’t want...”

Xander shook his head, face still tucked under Giles’ chin, and Giles, completely devoid of anything helpful to say, said nothing. After a minute or two, Xander pulled away. “Sorry. Sorry. Just... just a bit wigged again.”

“Understandable,” Giles assured him.

“I just... can I stay here for a bit?”

“As long as you like, of course. I, I, I’ll just...” He slipped out of bed and yanked his dressing gown from the peg on the door. Xander could do with some privacy, but before that... “Look, I’ll just, I’ll be back in a minute or two.”

He tried not to think that he was fleeing, but he knew he was. He had _no idea_ of what to say to Xander; he simply bolted for the bathroom. Five minutes there left him in better order; he could think at least of what needed to be done, if not what needed to be said.

He collected a bowl from the kitchen, and filled it with warm water; then he picked out a clean flannel and towel and went back to the bedroom. Xander was curled in the centre of the bed; when Giles came in, he unwound a little, and sat up, but he looked unhappy.

“I, I thought you might be more comfortable if you were less sticky.”

He could, of course, simply have left the water with Xander and retreated again, but somehow he couldn’t bear to do it; he set the bowl down on the bedside table, dipped and wrung out the cloth, and reached for Xander's hand. Xander frowned, but allowed it, and Giles, with a vague feeling of completing a sacrament, washed first one hand and then the other; dried both; put a hand under Xander's chin and delicately washed his face; ran the cloth over his chest and stomach on which the evidence of Xander's share of their success was half dried and flaking. He rinsed and wrung out the cloth again, and slipped it lightly down Xander's back, over and over; Xander sighed and Giles dried him carefully. Then he gestured lower.

“May I, may I look?”

Xander's expression shaded towards embarrassment; Giles hastened to explain. “I want to be sure that I haven’t, that you haven’t... Are you in pain?”

Xander shook his head hastily, and then reconsidered. “Achy, a bit, that’s all. I mean, I can feel...”

“May I look?” He sat still, eyes on Xander's face. If Xander refused, he wouldn’t insist. But Xander nodded jerkily and shifted to lie down again.

“On, on your side, perhaps? And if, if you just pull this knee up?” Xander jumped and tensed at the touch of the flannel, but Giles, although thorough, was gentle. “I, I need you to tell me if it hurts later. The, the ache might last a day. It shouldn’t be longer, and it shouldn’t feel any worse than, than overused muscles. Are, are you hungry? Thirsty?”

Xander shook his head, straightening his leg. “Just tired. I suppose...”

Giles interrupted before he could suggest going home. “Will you stay here tonight? I, I, you can sleep up here and I’ll go down to the couch.”

Xander looked across the width of the bed. “Seems a bit pointless you sleeping downstairs after what we just did. Unless you’d rather not... you’d rather I was somewhere else? I could just go home, I don’t mean to be in your way.”

“You wouldn’t, you’re not...” It occurred to him, not for the first time, that he and Xander seemed unable to hold a conversation which both of them understood. “I would like you to, to stay here. I, I, I don’t want you to be anywhere else. If I, if it would not make you uncomfortable to share the bed with me, I, I would like that.” Oh dear lord, he sounded so pompous. “I, I’m sorry, Xander, I’m not handling this well, am I? I don’t know what to say either. Except that perhaps if we were to change this sheet, which is both sticky and damp, we could be a little more comfortable.”

Actually, having something to do seemed to make them both a little more comfortable, even if the something was changing the bed in which they had just had sex, and thereby removing the evidence that they _had_ just had sex. Giles courteously averted his eyes when Xander got out of bed and pulled on his shorts and shirt, and for a minute there was no conversation more loaded than ‘have you enough on your side to tuck in?’

But after that, Xander sat down on the bed looking so lost that Giles found it _hurt_. He came round and sat beside him.

“I’m sorry,” he said gently. “I’m sorry that was, was required of you. I wouldn’t, wouldn’t have...”

“No,” agreed Xander miserably. “I’m sorry too. I know it was sorta the point, that I didn’t know what I was doing but I’m sorry it wasn’t... I’m sorry _I_ wasn’t...” He looked away. “It wasn’t great for you.”

As a sentence it made perfect sense.

It made no sense at all.

“What?”

All he could see of Xander's face was one ear, which was turning scarlet.

“Xander... if you think that wasn’t good for me, then... Bloody hell! Xander, my knees don’t work properly. My back isn’t what it might be. I can feel it up the insides of my thighs, probably as much as you can. And I don’t fucking care, because the only part of that I regret, the _only_ part I regret, is that you had no genuine choice about it.”

“Neither did you. And you had to do all the work, say all that stuff to keep me from wigging...”

It wouldn’t be true to say that he lost his temper; perhaps what he lost were his inhibitions. For once, he thought wildly, he was going to say precisely what he thought and be damned to the consequences. 

“I, I, did you think, all those things I said about what I wanted to do, did you think I was lying? When I said you were hot and tight and that it felt good, did you think I was _lying_? When I said I wanted...” He broke off, staring at Xander, who had turned his head a little; Giles caught his chin and turned it the rest of the way. He took a deep breath; he looked, really _looked_ at Xander, and read his expression. He thought about what Oz had said.

He took his caution, his fear and apprehension, his knowledge that he was more than twice Xander's age, his refusal to believe that anything good could be permitted to him; he crammed them into a corner of his mind and set an armed guard on them. The heart wanted what it wanted and that was as true for Xander as it was for Giles.

“I’m sorry, Xander,” he said formally. “I’m getting old and forgetful, and having you render me temporarily fuck-stupid is wonderful but it doesn’t help with the forgetfulness. I believe I mentioned my intention of making you come repeatedly, and I’m falling down on the deal: that was only once. Have you a preference for what’s next or shall I just think of something and see where it takes us?”

Xander's jaw dropped; Giles barrelled on. “You said you liked it when I had my mouth on your cock? And I believe I told you downstairs...”

Xander's tongue flickered around his lower lip. “That I could get any amount of it if I asked?”

Giles inclined his head, not breaking eye contact. Then he slid off the bed to his knees in front of Xander and gently set one hand on the inside of each thigh. What it was to be young! Embarrassment and discomfort counted as nothing: mention a potential blowjob and Xander's body was already showing interest.

“Honestly? You really... you wanna do those things?”

“I think another fuck had better wait for a day or two, unless you want to take a turn? We’ve got time. You saved the world, remember? So we have all the time we want, days and weeks and months and years if we want them. But more immediately, as for my mouth...?” He waited; he _had_ to have something to tell him that Xander understood.

It seemed that Xander did understand; he just didn’t know how to ask. Twice he took a short breath as if to speak; twice he hesitated. Then he said faintly, “Please?”

“Is now convenient?” Giles enquired cheerfully, and didn’t wait for an answer.

It went on being convenient for a gratifyingly long time.    

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Reflection](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1162394) by [Thea_Bromine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thea_Bromine/pseuds/Thea_Bromine)




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